EVEN BLUEBELLIES ROOT FOR PANTHERS IN CAROLINA.

Byline: Mark Blaudschun Boston Globe

Editorials offering support in the local paper. Newlyweds rushing through their reception so they can get to the game on time. Vacations being postponed. Pregnant women saying they are thinking of having their bellies painted blue on game day as a show of support.

None of this is new. This is, after all, North Carolina, where the sky is Carolina blue and such acts of loyalty are almost taken for granted, especially at the height of the season.

One difference. We're not talking about the North Carolina Tar Heels, not fretting over the strategy of coach Dean Smith or arguing the merits of Atlantic Coast Conference basketball.

Not yet, at least. For now, and for at least the next several days, the fever that has gripped this area is Panther Mania, as the Carolina Panthers continue their most improbable march through the NFL playoffs.

Here it is, nearly mid-January, and pro football is still the prime luncheon topic in the cafes and restaurants that dot the Uptown section of Charlotte.

Pick up the Charlotte Observer, as its readers did Tuesday morning, and you find the sports section dominated by stories on the Panthers and the Green Bay Packers, who will meet in today's NFC Championship game. So high is the fever that the advance for a normally high-profile basketball matchup between Duke and Clemson is relegated to the bottom of Page 2.

Then again, Charlotte always has been a little different, considering itself a little more sophisticated than its Carolina cousins around the state.

It was Charlotte that embraced the NBA Hornets, signifying the arrival of major league professional sports in the mid-South.

And now it is Carolina, along with that other upstart NFL franchise, that is attempting to set a new standard for quickest rise to the top; in fact, the Panthers and Jacksonville Jaguars already have achieved that, with berths in the conference championship games in only their second season.

Winning, obviously, has fueled the enthusiasm. The Panthers played nine games in Ericsson Stadium this season and won them all, including Sunday's remarkable 26-17 victory over the defending Super Bowl-champion Dallas Cowboys.

``Without these fans, I don't think we'd be where we are,'' said quarterback Kerry Collins. ``They're like another player on the field for us.''

After the win over the Cowboys, the fans stood around and cheered the Panthers until the players came out for a field-circling curtain call of handshakes, waves and high fives.

``It was the least we could do,'' said offensive tackle Blake Brockermeyer. ``They've been with us from the start.''

Amazingly, the ``start'' was only in 1995, two years after the NFL awarded Carolina and primary owner Jerry Richardson an expansion franchise.

When that decision was announced on Oct. 26, 1993, Ericsson Stadium, a state-of-the art facility that has been called the model for all future stadiums, was only a concept, nothing more than some industrialized property at the south end of the city.

For a year, the Panthers played their ``home'' games two hours away at Clemson University. But the fans had faith. Part of the deal for the new stadium was selling a new concept in stadium funding, personal seat licenses.

The Panthers sold 50,000 PSLs to 20,000 people on the first day they were available, a complete sellout of luxury boxes and club seats.

All of it has come together in almost textbook fashion. Richardson said his goal was to bring a Super Bowl team to Charlotte within 10 years. Now he is one victory away from getting to New Orleans, and the interest level in the franchise has gone off the scales.

Package tours to Green Bay for today's game ($879 a person) are close to selling out with Broach Sports Tours of Charlotte; it sold more than 30 in the first few hours they were offered.

Tuesday the Charlotte Observer offered directions for fans who want to drive to Green Bay - a complicated route that included travel on nine interstate highways for the 16-hour (in good weather) journey.

Preparations for game day are under way in Charlotte, too. The NFC Championship game will be shown on a 9- by 12-foot screen at Founders Hall, as the game against Dallas was last Sunday. But whereas 1,200 turned up last time, the crowd for the Packer game is expected to be double that.

Plans were being considered to show the game at Ericsson Stadium as well, but the long-range weather forecast for Charlotte today is not good, so that may be scrapped.

All over town, Panther parties are being planned, with supermarkets getting wiped out of party goods. Catering services are doing a booming business.

The game against Dallas drew a 45.5 television rating with a 70 percent share in the Charlotte area, which meant that during the game, 70 percent of the television sets in the area were tuned to the game.

What makes all this so intriguing is that neither the players nor fans are being jaded by success. It's all so new, so fresh, that there hasn't been any time to put a cynical face on any of it.

There is none of the ``loser syndrome'' that is part of the psyche of Denver and Buffalo fans. No one thinks that anything less than a Super Bowl championship represents failure, an attitude Cowboys fans have adopted.